This invention relates to the construction of concrete foundations for buildings and the like.
The formation of concrete foundations for buildings is well known. Various attempts have been made to provide various forms of building foundations and methods of forming building foundations.
One form of building foundation that has been used is a building foundation provided within an outer formwork, which involves the use of a plurality of spaced apart building elements or blocks which are spaced apart within the area bounded by the formwork, so as to provide a plurality of channels between the adjacent, spaced apart elements, for example intersecting channels which are often substantially at right-angles one with the other. It is known to provide spacers between the elements and in particular it is known to provide spacers at corners between the elements. Elongate reinforcing material then extends within the channels between the building elements and over the spacers, so as to be located between the elements, on the spacers, but above the ground surface. For example, such arrangements are known from Australian patent specifications Nos 562334, 584769 and 591816.
In Australian patent specifications Nos 562334 and 591816, there is disclosed a foundation arrangement and method of forming a foundation arrangement involving the use of cardboard box elements with spacer means provided at each corner, to separate the elements and so as to form channels therebetween. A similar arrangement is also disclosed in Australian patent specification No 584769.
In the building foundations used and known up until this time, and which use such spaced apart elements, a mesh of reinforcing is provided over the top of the elements before concrete is poured over the reinforcing, the elements and the mesh, within the periphery of the foundation being formed and as defined by outer formwork. This is disclosed in each of the above Australian patent specifications Nos 562334, 584769 and 591816. Further, the methods and arrangements used up until this time, and as exemplified in the above Australian patent specifications, involve the placing of reinforcing spacers on the top of the elements so as to support the mesh extending over the top of the elements.
Such arrangements have been found to have substantial disadvantages.
Firstly, in cases where hollow cardboard boxes or substantially hollow elements are used in foundation constructions, it is often necessary to place pressure on the upper surfaces of the elements during placement and location of the reinforcing mesh which extends over the upper surfaces of the elements. This can damage the elements. In addition, such elements can be affected by rain and the like and this particularly applies to cardboard spacing elements, which can be affected not only by rain, but also by pressure being applied to upper surfaces thereof. If this happens while reinforcing mesh is mounted on and over the upper surfaces of such elements, the reinforcing mesh can be moved or tilted out of position. This is particularly unsatisfactory from the point of view of providing satisfactory foundation constructions.
Further, the use of reinforcing mesh extending over the upper surfaces of the elements involves a substantial amount of reinforcing material such as steel reinforcing material. This is particularly expensive.
In arrangements known up until this time various forms of spacing elements have been used for spacing and locating reinforcing material (such as rods of metal reinforcing material) between and relative to foundation elements used in the building of foundation construction. Such spacing elements have not always been completely successful however.
The present invention sets out to provide an arrangement and method whereby one or more of these problems are overcome or at least substantially minimised.
It is a further object of this invention to provide straightforward and efficient spacing elements for use in foundation construction.
Other objects of this invention will become apparent from the following description.